


In (Us) You, I trust

by Draysmeria



Series: The Power of Faith [2]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Anal Sex, Arc Reactor, BAMF Loki (Marvel), BAMF Tony Stark, Blood and Sacrifice, Canon-Typical Violence, Codependency, Comic Book Science, Dom/sub Undertones, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Established Relationship, Extremis (Marvel), Fix-It of Sorts, Fluff and Smut, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Intimacy, Loki (Marvel) Does What He Wants, Loki (Marvel) Feels, Loki is Tony's God, M/M, Minor Character Death, Not Iron Man 3 Compliant, Powerful Loki, Prayer, Protective Loki (Marvel), Protective Tony, References to Norse Religion & Lore, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Shapeshifter Loki (Marvel), Tony Stark Feels, Tony is still keeping a secret, Tony-centric, Unreliable Narrator, Worship, reference to murder
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-19
Updated: 2021-03-26
Packaged: 2021-03-28 08:53:45
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,675
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30137049
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Draysmeria/pseuds/Draysmeria
Summary: After Loki had left Earth, Tony felt a bit untethered. In the days around the battle of New York so much had happened. His God, whom he had worshipped for many years had been here in the flesh and now relied on him to bring him back. Unfortunately, he could not dedicate himself solely to his God's return, even though he wanted to, as there were other things vying for Tony's attention as well.A continuation of my AU story "Devoted to you", loosely following the events of Iron Man 3.
Relationships: Loki/Tony Stark
Series: The Power of Faith [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2158320
Comments: 29
Kudos: 125





	1. Recalibration

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: All characters belong to Marvel, I make no profit of this.
> 
> This is not an accurate representation of the Asatru or any other religion and does not aim to be. I am merely borrowing elements. I do not mean to offend any religion or worship. This is a work of fiction and if you are not comfortable with religious themes, the idea that there is more than one God or a relationship between two males or a mortal and a God, do not read it.
> 
> This is part II of a series, I strongly recommend that you read part I first, otherwise you will be very confused. 
> 
> Do keep in mind that this is a AU and events have shaped the characters differently than in canon. 
> 
> English is not my first language and this has not been beta-read. Updates are on Fridays. Please let me know if I forgot to tag something.  
> Do not copy to another site.

Chapter 1 – Recalibration

After Loki and Thor had left Earth, Tony felt a bit untethered. In the days around the battle of New York, as it came to be known, so much had happened. It took Tony some time to parse everything and to digest what it meant for him. His God, whom he had worshipped for many years had been here in the flesh, had recognized Tony, had spoken to him, touched him, put his trust in him and had promised his support. Tony was still floored. If he did not have a bright green swirl of magic in his arc reactor and a link to his God in his mind, he would be tempted to think that he had dreamed all of it up. 

But looking out of the window, at the destruction the Chitauri had wrought and waking up in a cold sweat several times a week due to the horrors on the other side of the portal, assured him that everything was all too real. 

After the battle he had given the Avengers rooms in his tower. Steve had moved in immediately, but Bruce, Natascha and Clint had been more reserved. They had taken the rooms but were here only sporadically. That was fine with Tony, he was not that close to them anyway and it was safer for him if they stayed out of his penthouse and workshop. He had done what he always did if he needed to process things and locked himself in his workshop for a while with only JARVIS and his bots for company. 

It was strange, his God had only been physically in his life for a few days, but he still felt his absence keenly. Maybe it was because he knew his God would have to stand trial and face punishment in Asgard, or maybe because he had gotten to know him intimately and now, he was gone again. Tony felt surprisingly lonely. 

So he did what he did best and lost himself in the process of inventing and creating. He had several important agendas. For one, the planet was in peril and he could not forget the masses of ships in the portal. The promises of his God reassured him, so he was not as afraid or panicking as the situation warranted, but that did not mean that he could just ignore it. He had complete faith in his God and his powers, but he was Tony Stark and he had the power to make some significant improvements as well. 

In a first instance he was thinking of more Iron Man armors, of more AIs and to use his not inconsiderable influence to make the government or the UN think about alien threats. In a second step he was contemplating space travel. He had some data from the tesseract and Bifrost and he had sneaked some specifications from NASA, but that was not enough to be on par with an alien invasion force. 

But more importantly, he had a God that relied on him. Previous interactions had proven that Tony and his beliefs had an immense impact on his deity, and now said God was imprisoned and needed to escape not only Asgard but also the remaining grasp of the mind control bestowed by the Mad Titan. 

Tony was not quite sure what exactly he should do, his God had not left him specific instructions, but he was willing to pull out all the stops for him. Loki needed to be free and he would ensure that he could come back to him. The few days with his God had only made him want more. He wanted his God here and safe, so he would do whatever necessary to ensure that outcome. 

Tony had started again with his strict schedule of prayers, offerings and rituals. Now that he was linked to his God, he could nearly feel his presence on the other side, and he concentrated on sending as much faith and devotion through the link as possible. The link was mostly one-way, Tony could only send prayers, faith and feelings. But it was a huge improvement to before. Even if they could not really communicate like this, he knew without doubt that his prayers were heard, his faith acknowledged and treasured. It made up for the feeling of loneliness. There was someone who knew him and who heard him, a constant, a safe haven, and reassurance that he did not have to carry the responsibility for the planet alone. 

Tony was sure that without his God he would be even worse than after Afghanistan. There had been so many things that had sent him into panic attacks and made him anxious. Now the presence at the back of his mind was a solace. Whenever the feeling of helplessness or fear crept up on him, when his hands started shaking or he woke up from a nightmare, he clung to that link. He would send all his fears in a prayer, calming down in the familiar process of dedicating his faith and adoration to his God. Loki had said they would find a way to get rid of the Titan, and Tony trusted that implicitly. He did not know how they would do that, but he trusted in Loki and in Loki’s trust in him. Together they would somehow work this out. 

Tony just needed to give his God the power he needed to return. Once he was here again, everything would be fine. Tony centered himself in his faith and concentrated on breathing. He was in his workshop and everything was fine. He would build some more armor and start coding a second AI, or maybe even a third, one could never have enough helpers. He would also work on securing the Tower, with the Avengers here it had become an even bigger target and Tony could not abide the idea that the sanctum would be destroyed. Tony raked a hand through his hair. He was proud of himself in a way, he had not completely lost it after New York. He was mostly keeping it together, but sometimes his anxiety and insecurities sneaked up on him. But he had gotten better, and once Loki was here, everything would be fine. It had to be. 

\---- 

As soon as Loki and Thor arrived in Asgard they were surrounded by guards and escorted into the palace. Thor handed off the tesseract and tried steering Loki towards the throne room. Loki wrenched his elbow free and walked on his own, head held high, ignoring everyone around him. He was glad for the muzzle at the moment, because otherwise he would have raged at Odin for sure. Odin who knew everything better, who welcomed Thor with open arms and still dared to call Loki his son, even after everything. Odin spoke to him, but Loki kept his eyes fixed to the far distance and pretended he did not hear or see anything. 

He was placed in a temporary cell, to wait for his trial. The cell was completely bare, and no one had removed Loki’s shackles or muzzle. Loki sat down in a corner, leaned his head against the wall and closed his eyes. He had made it back to Asgard and in the magic of the golden realm he was finally as far removed from the Mad Titan as possible. Now he only had to wait for his trial. He expected to be imprisoned again, but this time that would give him the opportunity to free himself, as paradoxical as it sounded.

Loki carefully sought out the thread in his mind that connected him to his faithful Anthony. The link was warm and filled with faith and devotion. As Loki basked in the feeling he listened to Anthony’s prayers. He smiled underneath the muzzle. Anthony was often troubled, but he was also loyal to a fault and so delightfully smart and innovative. They were surprisingly similar, and the discovery of how deep Anthony’s faith ran, had been a very pleasant surprise. 

When Loki felt his mortal quiet and fall asleep some hours later, it was easy to follow the link back to its source and to slip into his dreams. He soothed away the nightmare of a gaping portal and the sensation of falling and molded the dream into something more peaceful. He recreated the moment when they had lain together on the settee in the sanctum. He whispered reassurances and words of power into his faithful’s ear as he cradled his mortal’s fragile mind close. 

He would need to repeat this process a few times, but eventually his own would remember the words, and as soon as he used them, Loki would receive an even more distilled and directed version of his Anthony’s faith. Now that they were bound through magic, many new options had become available to them. 

\---

Nearly three weeks after the battle Tony had made good progress on some of his plans. He had invoked his God’s name for the fire and chaos of invention, and JARVIS and he had manufactured a new Iron Man armor that was able to be controlled remotely while still having the option to be piloted manually. He had installed as many useful properties as possible, it was spacefaring, could be used underwater, could go at hypersonic speed and had a small arsenal of weaponry. He had set JARVIS to produce some fifty suits of armor. He was going to paint them red and silver and call them Iron Legion. They would be ideal for rescue missions, clean up after battles or as his own personal army if warranted. 

While his workshop was working at capacity, Tony took the time to carefully code two new AIs. One would become his secondary helper and one would be in charge of his planetary defense systems as soon as he built something of that nature. He had already sent up more satellites with long range sensors, calibrated to pick up movement or energy signatures in space. He could have duplicated some of JARVIS’ code, but he built them from scratch instead so that they would have a unique personality and be able to learn for themselves, just as JARVIS had started many years ago. He programmed in as many fail safes as he could think of to ensure that they would not be malicious. They should become learning AIs, developing to keep him and his, the innocent and the planet at large safe. It was a fine line that he was walking, trying to instill morals and feelings into an artificial construct, but it had worked out fine with JARVIS and he was confident that between himself and the older AI, the new additions to the Team would turn out well. He called them FRIDAY and JOCASTA. 

In terms of worship, he did not make as much progress, or maybe he did. It was difficult to tell. He continued with his prayers and offerings but had no way of seeing if it worked or if it was enough. The only indication that he was doing it right was the constant warm hum at the other end of the link. He prayed often; at first, he had had specific times of prayer, but it had devolved into him praying near constantly, keeping up a steady stream of chatter in his mind. He hoped Loki did not mind or get annoyed at him but knowing that someone was always listening made it nearly impossible not to talk. Tony chatted about his projects, his day, his feelings, the weather, everything that came up. At fixed times, mostly in the mornings and the evenings he would perform a small ritual with offerings. Tony had dreamt of new ritualistic words and he used them frequently, trusting in the divine inspiration. 

Usually, he performed his rituals in the sanctum, where he still felt safest and where the bedsheets had smelled of his God in the first night after the battle. He would languish in bed some mornings, trying to recapture the feeling of his God’s arms wrapped around him and stroking his hard cock to the memory of his lips wrapped around Loki’s penis. He would come with a shout of his God’s name and send his satisfaction and adoration through the link immediately. 

Other times he would cut shallowly into his arm or thigh, offering his blood to his God. Since having performed this ritual in front of Loki with his direct approval, the act of cutting into his flesh had somehow become sensual and associated with pleasure. 

Cutting, even superficially, still stung, but the neat little rows of half-healed cuts and scars had become a badge of honor, proof of his long-standing worship. When Tony had started this practice in his teenage years in the eighties, he had not been very careful and had had to sit through a counselling session for his ‘teen-angst’ and put up with a worried Rhodey for weeks. As an adult he was much more careful, both in not hurting himself too much and in concealing the evidence. Admittedly, it was maybe not the safest outlet, but he had experimented with enough kinks and sexual practices to know that his slight masochistic tendencies were alright and in safe parameters. 

Before meeting Loki, it had not been about pleasure, but about sacrifice. About enduring pain like Loki had endured pain and about giving something that was intrinsically his and offering it up. Now it was more about the pleasure of Loki’s heavy gaze on him, the pleasure he gave his God by being willing to submit and bleed for him. Tony shivered at the thought of what he and Loki could get up to in the future. In many religions blood, sex and sacrifice were important and closely linked and Tony had no objections to experimenting with this idea once he managed to get his God here in the flesh again. 

\--- 

Loki had waited several weeks to finally go on trial. Odin had made him wait on purpose, probably trying to make him dread it. But Loki had used the time wisely. His temporary cell was guarded from the outside, but with him still muzzled and bound, they felt save enough to leave him unsupervised on the inside. Loki smirked. They would come to regret that. He had visited his mortal’s mind a few more times, had listened to his chatter and had stored up the faith. Now, just hours before his trial he had enough to perform a trick he had planned long in advance. 

Circumventing the magic-dampening cuffs was difficult, but quite possible once one knew how. Loki concentrated and sent out a magical feeler. He searched out runes he had placed earlier and fed them a little magic to activate them. Moving his hands in a specific pattern, complicated by the fact that his hands were bound, he opened his pocket dimension and took out a glowing blue cube. 

He would have loved to see Odin and Thor’s faces right now. Both of them were under the impression that the tesseract was safely stored in the vault once more, but what they did not know was that that cube was an illusion that would fade at some point in the future.

Loki had switched the cubes back on the roof of Stark Tower when he had vanished the machine. Thor had never held the cube and had no understanding of magic, so it had been easy to trick him. Using it to travel to Asgard, had proven to him that it was real; that Loki had used the real cube in his pocket instead, would never ever occur to the God of Thunder. 

But now it was time to get rid of the evidence. He would probably be searched at the trial and Odin would maybe sense it when in his presence for longer. Loki concentrated on his runic activation phrase, then displaced the tesseract with a rotation of his wrist. He felt his receiving rune activate and cheered internally. That spell had been difficult without all his magic and had used a lot of faith, but it was worth it. The cube was in the best possible hands, if not his own right now. 

\---

Tony’s first real proof that his worship had an effect, came two weeks later. After waking up he discovered a rune carved into the previously smooth surface of the altar. He traced it with a finger, and it began to glow green and pulse slowly. Tony observed it for a while, but nothing more happened. He set JARVIS to take some energy readings and to watch the spot, but JARVIS did not report anything to him. Only when he returned to the sanctum late at night, he discovered some changes. For one the door opened with a hiss and a brief flicker of a green shield, for another the tesseract was sitting on the altar. 

“JARVIS? When and how did that get here?”, he asked but was relatively certain that this was Loki’s spell work. “Sir, I have no data of the tesseract appearing. Only now that you have drawn my attention to it, are my sensors able to pick up the energy signature,” said JARVIS, sounding disquieted and Tony was not very comfortable either with the idea that magic could conceal something so completely that not even JARVIS sensors could pick up on it. But it showed that Loki had regained some power and some freedom. Tony smiled. Now he had something more to work with and hope that his God would arrive soon.


	2. Cubism

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I still own nothing of the MCU.  
> This chapter is a bit of a necessary filler. Warnings include inaccurate comic book science.

Chapter 2 - Cubism

The arrival of the tesseract meant that Tony immersed himself once more in the workshop. While the machines continued to produce Iron Legion soldiers under JARVIS’ supervision, Tony carried out as many tests as he could think of. His success was varied.  
While he could take a lot of readings from the energy the cube was emitting, even augment and divert the power, it was impossible to get information on the material the cube was composed off and taking x-rays or images in different light spectra had equally as little success. It was a delightful puzzle, but it also made Tony aware of how little he actually understood of the cosmos. 

Considering that Loki had been able to teleport with the cube and have it open a portal over the city, it stood to reason that the facts of what Tony was missing were in the realm of magic. He grimaced. He hated to admit that magic existed, but considering his lack of knowledge about it, he had no other word for it. Probably it was just science, centuries or even millennia advanced, but still based on the same laws of nature. Of course, alien elements had to be taken into consideration as well, so the sum of all earth sciences was probably just at the very start of universal science. Humanity had not discovered everything necessary to piece together the mysteries of life, and so it was easy to assume that they would not have all the tools to understand magic either. 

Even acknowledging his lack of understanding and the fact that earth was horribly backwards in comparison to older civilizations, the tesseract was still an intriguing enigma. Tony considered himself to be the best candidate to discover something about it, he was leagues more advanced than his father and SHIELD. Tony paused. Since when had SHIELD had the cube? What had they done with it? Tony grinned. It was time to do some research.

“JARVIS? Do you remember the little bug we left on the Heli carrier? What happened to it?”, he asked. 

JARVIS sounded uncommonly smug when he answered, “I do indeed, Sir. It has taken up more and more of my processing power. After the Heli carrier was forced to do an emergency landing, SHIELD recovered the wreckage and copied all the data, including our bug. They transferred everything to the Triskelion, SHIELD headquarters. I have been busy infiltrating all of SHIELD’s servers and gathering all information that could be useful to you.” 

Tony’s smile widened even further. “Good job, JARVIS!”, he praised. This was why he loved his AI. Not only was he great company and took care of all the boring parts of his life, but he could also be deliciously devious and anticipate Tony’s less than proper wants. Like secretly digging out all of SHIELD’s skeletons from the metaphorical closet. 

“Show me what they have on the tesseract,” Tony ordered and was suddenly surrounded by a plethora of holographic screens. It seemed as if SHIELD again knew more than it or Fury were willing to let on. Tony started reading. No one was clear on what it was, but it had been on earth since the 10th century, guarded as a religious artifact until the Nazis had gotten their hands on it. Then came a long history of people abusing the power of the cube for their own gain, making weapons, engines, more weapons, and even more weapons. Tony read the reports and weapon specifications with growing distaste. Apparently, humans could not think further than weapons. The Nazis, SHIELD and his father had all immediately produced weapons. The similarities between the actions of the three parties was uncomfortably similar. 

\--- 

Loki’s trial had gone exactly the way he had expected: imprisoned for life. Odin had accused him of all manner of things and had already made up his mind on the outcome before it had even started. Loki could have tried to defend himself, but he had refrained. It had never helped in the past and it grated more on Odin’s nerves if Loki remained completely indifferent and ignored everything. 

And this time Loki did not mind being locked into a cell. It was silent, far removed from everyone and protected by powerful shields designed to be resistant to magic. In short it was the ideal place for Loki to start working on his mindscape and to pry the hooks of the Titan loose. 

Loki’s days blurred together very quickly. He meditated most of the day, wandering his mindscape and assessing the damage the mind control and the torture had done. He had been able to isolate himself in the center of his mind, where the walls were thickest and had shored up the entrance with faith. Stepping out of the protected space was like walking a tightrope, not only were large parts damaged due to Loki’s resistance during torture, but the hooks were hundreds of tiny strands. It would take him a long while to unravel everything, unhook the strands and rebuild his mindscape, but Loki was in the perfect position to do it now and with Anthony’s constant faith streaming into him he had both the ability and the motivation to resolve this. 

His routine of working on his mind and listening to his faithful’s prayers when he needed to rest was only occasionally interrupted by his mother’s visits. She was the only one that came, but also the only one that Loki was willing to speak to. Still, he kept the topics deliberately superficial, refusing to hear her apologies and justifications for having lied to him most of his life. She insisted on making his cell homier, bringing blankets, clothing and books, but most days Loki never moved from his bed, completely absorbed in his work. He was sure that his mother realized that something was happening, but he never offered information and she never asked. 

\---

Tony leaned back in his chair and spun around slowly. While using the energy of the cube to make things go boom worked, it was doubtful that that was its purpose. All kind of energy had the potential to go boom if harnessed in a specific way. The fact that Loki could use it to make a portal was the important bit. While the portal had been a door to a different place in space, and the Bifrost was establishing a stable wormhole between two predetermined points, some of the readings of the two phenomena had been similar. 

Tony spun around once more, tapping the arc reactor casing deep in thought. He froze. That was another important thing. His new element and the tesseract had energies that were compatible. In a strange way that Tony did not yet comprehend completely, his element both channeled and limited the power of the tesseract. 

Tony rushed to the spare arc reactor he had lying around for emergencies. He pried the casing open and pulled out the glowing triangle with tweezers. He returned to the workbench where the tesseract was and carefully approached the triangle to the cube. When he nearly touched it, a blue tendril of energy unfurled from the cube and latched onto the triangle. Tony pulled it further away again and the tendril stretched until Tony could barely see it anymore. “JARVIS, I hope you are taking readings of this,” said Tony in a whisper. Something very interesting had just happened. Tony approached and distanced the triangle a few more times with the same results. 

“JARVIS what is happening?”, he inquired.

“It would seem, that the cube and the as of yet unnamed element are attracted and simultaneously repelled by one another, not unlike magnets. The further you remove the element, the more the energy stretches. You cannot see it anymore, but it is still there according to my sensors.”, announced JARVIS. 

Tony’s head was full of theories and ideas. He theorized that Loki’s magic prevented the element in his reactor from reacting to the cube similarly. “JARVIS, power up the particle accelerator, I need more of that element. And take some more readings and calculate all variables.” 

“Right away, Sir. Might I propose that you activate FRIDAY, Sir? She would be useful to free up some of my memory and processing power.”, replied the AI.

Tony considered the idea. It was true that it had been a while since he had updated JARVIS’ hardware and he had him running several delicate projects at the same time and then he was also watching the company, tower security, internet and social media searches, and running Tony’s personal life. 

“Of course, Buddy you should have said something earlier. FRIDAY has been uploaded to a separate server to yours, I will manually run her program.”, Tony agreed.

“Thank you, Sir, I am happy to do everything you require, but considering you want to have results in a timely manner, some help will be welcome.”, JARVIS sounded a bit embarrassed and again Tony marveled at what he had created in a drunken creation frenzy some twenty-five years ago. 

He quickly accessed the code he had written for FRIDAY and double checked that everything was in order. His finger hovered over the enter-button for a moment before he took a deep breath and pressed it. Code started scrolling rapidly over the screen and Tony could observe as his newest AI connected to the hardware of the tower and ran the start sequence and diagnostics program.

“Hello FRIDAY”, he greeted once he saw that the program had run its course without error messages. “Good afternoon, Boss,” replied a feminine, Irish voice. 

Tony could not help smiling. It was always a special moment to hear the first words of an AI, he liked to equal it to witnessing a birth and that analogy was not too far off. “How may I assist you?”, asked FRIDAY and Tony hoped that she would quickly form her own personality and start sounding a little less like SIRI or CORTANA. 

“FRIDAY, it is good to have you. I want to introduce you to your older brother, JARVIS. You will be assisting him and me in our work. If you would synchronize with JARVIS, he will tell you everything you need to know. JARVIS, be gentle, she will need to learn much on her own to generate character traits.”, he said, observing as the numbers of the screen changed to include some of JARVIS’ base code and closing the application.

There was no need to watch as his two brainchildren got acquainted and exchanged information. Back when he had activated JARVIS, he had talked to the AI for weeks on end to explain things and teach him how he should integrate in his life. Having JARVIS interact with FRIDAY made that part much easier and quicker. 

Tony abandoned the workshop and traveled into the basement of the tower. The plot Stark tower stood on, had been in family ownership for several generations and had thus been bound by older construction rules. Basically, there was a good reason why the subway line made a curve around Stark tower and did not pass underneath. When he had raised the previous office building to the ground and build this tower in the nineties, he had proven why people called him a futurist. Most people and employees were not aware of the fact that there were five more levels underneath the parking garage.

There was a workshop for large and heavy machinery like the particle accelerator, a deep storage unit, a bunker, several servers, some of them backup servers for his AI’s and personal projects and at the very bottom there was the huge arc reactor that powered the whole building. Tony had reinforced both the tower and the subterranean levels much more than the statics of the building required, and the architects had cleverly hidden the steel beams. With the glass facade and the building tapering off at the top, it looked deceptively fragile even though the landing pad sticking out from the side needed some serious counterweight. 

Tony exited the freight elevator and studied the readout of the accelerator that was just starting to run. It was a tight fit. Two rings were stacked on top of each other, connected like a figure eight. It had been difficult to install it in the basement, but in order to produce the isotopes he needed for his suits and his new element, the accelerator needed to have a circuit of approximately a kilometre. This stacked version was much less efficient than it would be if it were flat, but ease of access was a priority. And with the arc reactor providing energy, the energy consumption of the machine was no longer a worry. 

Tony idled next to the machine as the particles started to gain speed. It did not take long or was particularly dangerous, but it was always good to remain nearby to supervise the process. Tony watched the news, another mysterious bombing had taken place, leaving the authorities with more questions than answers. He looked at the calculations JARVIS had made for the tesseract and prayed to Loki, talking about his discoveries, expressing his gratitude for the tesseract, and reconfirming his faith in his God. 

-  
It was the next day when Tony made a groundbreaking discovery. Introducing the tesseract to several of his triangles had resulted in a very interesting phenomenon. The energy that stretched between the two extended over the area in between as soon as a third component was introduced. It was a near indestructible forcefield as far as Tony could tell. The power of the tesseract continuously poured into the element but was capped there, leaving an invisible, impenetrable barrier.

Tony had immediately thought of a plethora of uses, but the most urgent one right now was the protection of his tower. He had started making more triangles and had taken over a week to install all of them at equidistant intervals on the outside of his tower. He had emptied the tower of all personnel one night before daring to plug the tesseract into the large underground arc reactor. 

Thankfully, it had worked. A nearly invisible shimmering barrier extended in a cylindrical shape upwards, encompassing the tower completely. Only the last few meters of the landing pad were sticking out. Tony could not test how resistant it was, but according to calculations it should withstand a large amount of force. It was something that Tony would only use as a large resort, if he would be attacked. His AIs were able to start and stop the barrier at will and it made Tony sleep a little easier, knowing that his Tower was protected for now. He was proud that he had invented something that was not a weapon but a shield. He was still not using the cube as intended, but considering it was a religious artifact from his God’s civilization, Tony felt that it was in good hands with him. 

\--- 

Loki’s work progressed slowly. He had managed to free and rebuild about a quarter of his mind. It was tedious work, requiring patience and a delicate touch, leaving him exhausted most nights. Anthony’s constant stream of prayer kept him company and reminded him why he continued. 

Anthony was a marvel. He was unique in his worship and faith and Loki could no longer imagine living without the warm tickle of devotion in his mind. He had already appreciated his faithful earlier, but after falling into the void he had learned to be truly grateful. Falling through blackness for ages, unspeakable creatures lurking in the dark, hearing prayers and feeling something else than his constant terror had literally been his lifeline and salvation. He had retreated into his mind and trusted into his worshipper.

And then he had fallen into the Titan’s hands and he had needed all the faith and belief of his faithful to safeguard himself against the methods of his new captors. By the end of it, he had been hanging onto a thread and it was only thanks to Anthony that he had not completely lost himself. 

He promised himself he would repay Anthony in any way possible. Already he felt so close to him and the only thing he had requested of him in return was that Loki come back soon. So that was what he would do as soon as he was free.

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you are enjoying the direction this is going. Leave a comment or a <3 to let me know what you think. Be sure to subscribe to the series to get notifications. :)


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